PORTLAND, Ore. – TriMet's effort to get tough on passengers who don’t pay their fares is taking a toll on the court system.
The flood of people stretching the system beyond capacity has become known as "TriMet Tuesdays" where the court system deals with an unexpected amount of people who didn't pay to ride on the MAX. It's an unexpected consequence of TriMet's new get-tough policy.
The line of people this Tuesday spilled out onto the Justice Center’s steps. They were there because TriMet has hired more fare inspectors and deployed more “get-tough” patrols – tickets now outnumber warnings, 3 to 1.
This Tuesday there were 358 tickets to process and standing room only in the courtroom.
“They did it all at once and they didn’t stop to think about what the downstream affects would be,” said Multnomah County Court administrator Doug Bray.
But TriMet says it won’t back off and wait until the court system can catch up.
“This is about what is fair and people paying their fares,” said TriMet spokeswoman Mary Fetsch. “We certainly understand (that the court system can’t keep up). We can certainly have a conversation with them. This is about people paying their fare.”
The court system is stretched so thin judges have decided to give riders an option: get in one line to fight the ticket or get in another line that will reduce the fine to $50 if the person pleads guilty.
These TriMet Tuesdays started three weeks ago. The first week there were 413 tickets to process. It dropped to 252 the next week and then spiked this Tuesday.
Court administrators expect it to continue and are looking for another, bigger place to handle everyone.
According to TriMet, it gets only $69 from a $175 ticket. Thirty-seven dollars is for a unitary assessment that goes to the state; forty-five dollars goes to the state for an offense surcharge, and the county takes $18. That leaves a “fine” of $75. Then a state court administrator takes out 8 percent of that.
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Crazy much? And TriMet couldn't care less, quite obviously shown by Mary Fetsch as she says “This is about what is fair and people paying their fares. We certainly understand (that the court system can’t keep up). We can certainly have a conversation with them. This is about people paying their fare.”
I understand the need to crack down on fare evaders more, especially the people who have a history of doing it, but also there is a need for more reliability by the ticket machines(whether they're working that day or not) and their placement on the MAX platforms.
But I do think it is absolutely ridiculous that now warnings are only very rare. There is human error, and let the person explain their reason for not having a fare. Let the person have a chance to defend themselves. If it was because a ticket machine wasn't working and that is verified or if it was the first time the person has ever evaded, or they just have a good, valid reason that they didn't get their fare (no, not the 'i was running for the MAX train and didn't have time' or the 'i forgot', excuses like that don't work), but a reason such as that the machine at the MAX platform didn't take cash/change and that was all the person had with them or the credit/debit(?) card thing didn't work with the only one they had, give them a break. Things do happen. There are a lot of honest people riding the system who always do have their fare, but can one day, after years of always having a ticket/transfer/pass with them, not have their fare that one day. I know people that have had that happen to and it is just not fair.
TriMet can be stricter about fares, but just not unreasonably--there has to be some heart and understanding. The fare system TriMet has in place is mostly to blame. There wouldn't be too much need (or not nearly as great a need) for fare inspectors if TriMet had the type of rail system where the only way possible to access the MAX or WES platform and board the train was if you had a valid ticket or pass.
